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Idea Machines

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Show Info:

Idea Machines is a deep dive into the systems and people that bring innovations from glimmers in someone's eye all the way to tools, processes, and ideas that can shift paradigms.
We see the outputs of innovation systems everywhere but rarely dig into how they work. Idea Machines digs below the surface into crucial but often unspoken questions to explore themes of how we enable innovations today and how we could do it better tomorrow.
Idea Machines is hosted by Benjamin Reinhardt.Read more »

Idea Machines is a deep dive into the systems and people that bring innovations from glimmers in someone's eye all the way to tools, processes, and ideas that can shift paradigms.
We see the outputs of innovation systems everywhere but rarely dig into how they work. Idea Machines digs below the surface into crucial but often unspoken questions to explore themes of how we enable innovations today and how we could do it better tomorrow.
Idea Machines is hosted by Benjamin Reinhardt.Read Less

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Most Recent Episode

Unleashing Talent with Matt Clifford [Idea Machines #14]

May 12
·
51 minutes

In this episode I speak to Matt Clifford about talent investing, how big long term projects can start small, and financial innovations.

Matt is the CEO and co-founder of Entrepreneur First. Entrepreneur First, abbreviated as EF, is a fascinating system. It starts with cohorts of around fifty to a hundred ambitious, talented people who want to start companies but might not even have an idea to build around.

Key Takeaways

The mental model of predictable vs. unpredictable value.

The idea that hypothesis testing speed predicts success even in projects where you won't see real results any time soon.

The idea of money as a commodity that fuels innovations

Background on EF (context for some of the podcast)

EF then helps cohort members pair up into teams and get companies off the ground. Matt and Alice Bentinck started EF in 2011 and the history is kind of a crazy story: it started as a non-profit and now has raised a massive fund from LPs. One of the highlights in the story that really put EF on the map was a company named Magic Pony that sold to Twitter for an unconfirmed 150 million dollars eighteen months after starting at EF. There are links to Matt talking more about both the structure of EF and EF's history in the show notes. EF is a fascinating innovation system because it challenges many ideas that have basically become gospel in the startup world - everything from "if someone isn't willing to start a company in a garage with no income they don't have what it takes" to "only founding teams with a long working relationship can succeed."

In this episode I speak to Matt Clifford about talent investing, how big long term projects can start small, and financial innovations.

Matt is the CEO and co-founder of Entrepreneur First. Entrepreneur First, abbreviated as EF, is a fascinating system. It starts with cohorts of around fifty to a hundred ambitious, talented people who want to start companies but might not even have an idea to build around.

Key Takeaways

The mental model of predictable vs. unpredictable value.

The idea that hypothesis testing speed predicts success even in projects where you won't see real results any time soon.

The idea of money as a commodity that fuels innovations

Background on EF (context for some of the podcast)

EF then helps cohort members pair up into teams and get companies off the ground. Matt and Alice Bentinck started EF in 2011 and the history is kind of a crazy story: it started as a non-profit and now has raised a massive fund from LPs. One of the highlights in the story that really put EF on the map was a company named Magic Pony that sold to Twitter for an unconfirmed 150 million dollars eighteen months after starting at EF. There are links to Matt talking more about both the structure of EF and EF's history in the show notes. EF is a fascinating innovation system because it challenges many ideas that have basically become gospel in the startup world - everything from "if someone isn't willing to start a company in a garage with no income they don't have what it takes" to "only founding teams with a long working relationship can succeed."